


No Going Back

by Duck_Life



Series: X-Men Shorties [14]
Category: X-Men (Comicverse)
Genre: Arguing, Gen, Lovers to Friends, Resurrection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-16
Updated: 2019-05-16
Packaged: 2020-03-06 04:54:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18844048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Duck_Life/pseuds/Duck_Life
Summary: Jean makes the case for why she and Scott can't just pick up where they left off now that they're both back from the dead.





	No Going Back

“I mean,” Scott says, “you’re alive. I’m alive. We’re back. So…”

“So… everything just goes back to the way it was?” Jean says. “Scott, I… it doesn’t work like that. It can’t.”

“We got married.”

“I know, I was there,” she says. “Till death do us part. And we died. And we parted.” Jean’s not used to seeing him with so much nervous energy. It’s like Scott can’t decide how to stand— arms crossed, arms at his side, feet apart, feet together, pacing. “We can’t pretend that the last several years didn’t happen.”

“Why not?” he says, smiling, kind of manic. 

“Because it doesn’t work like that!” she says again.

“It’s supposed to.” 

“I know you know me better than to think that I want us to be together  _ just _ because that’s how things are ‘supposed to’ be.”

Scott’s expression drops. “So you don’t want to be with me.”

“Of course I want to be with you,” she snaps. “I love you. I’m used to you. You know what brand of peanut butter I like and my Christmas ornaments all say ‘Scott & Jean.’ Picking up where we left off would be so goddamn  _ easy _ , Scott. But I don’t think we can take the easy way on this.” 

“God forbid something in our lives be easy,” he sighs. 

“Do you remember when you merged with Apocalypse?” It’s bit of a bad segue, but she’s going somewhere with it. 

Scott’s face darkens. “I try not to.”

“There’s a world where you never came back from that,” Jean says, her voice catching. “And I never got past it. Never remarried, never fell in love again. I lived with your ghost.”

“I’m…” It’s not like it’s something he can apologize for, but he  _ is _ sorry. And she looks so sad.

Jean plunges on. “When I died. When I died in New York, you made a choice. You could have stayed with Emma, or left her. There’s a world where you left her, where you lived with  _ my _ ghost. And it’s just as bad.” 

“I’m not a ghost, Jean,” he swears. “You aren’t one, either.” 

“If we died like normal people—”

“We don’t do anything like normal people.” That, at least, earns him a familiar smile. “I’m uh. I’m sorry for… I didn’t mean to put pressure on you to—”

“No, it’s fine,” she says, and despite her whole argument against it, she  _ does _ feel like the same sixteen-year-old who could take down Unus the Untouchable and Mastermind but didn’t know how to string together a sentence to tell Slim Summers how she felt. “I mean, I married you once. It wasn’t an outlandish assumption to think I might do it again.” 

“I do love you,” he says. “If that matters.”

“Of course it matters,” she says. “I love you, too. And I love Warren. And you love Madelyne. We have big hearts, Scott. They were built for more than just us.” She holds both his hands with both of hers. “What we had was incredible. Nobody could ever replicate it. Least of all us.” 

“That’s… that’s kind of profound, Grey.” 

“I have my moments.” And she smirks. “Besides, I have a theory about what this is really all about.”

“Hm?”

“You’re trying to jump-start The Saga of Scott and Jean for the same reason you’re wearing the blue and yellow costume with all the pouches,” she says shrewdly.

“You’re one to talk, Shoulder Pads.” 

Jean grins, delighted. “You’re hiding in what we had,” she says. “Which is totally understandable. But I’m not enabling you and I don’t want you to enable me either.”

“ _ Enable _ you?”

“I would  _ love _ to hide,” she says. “In the past. In my marriage. In everything that was true a long time ago, before I died. But it’s a whole new world out there. And that world is a  _ mess _ . And you and I aren’t gonna be able to fix it without doing a little adapting and evolving ourselves.” 

“Why do you always have to be right?”

“Hank’s influence, probably.” 

Scott finally stops fidgeting, finally stops pacing. He looks more comfortable with himself than he did five minutes ago, but he also looks more tired. “What do I do now?” 

“ _ Now _ ,” Jean says, “we’re going to pop some popcorn. I’m going to put on one of those  _ Three Stooges _ DVDs we’ve both seen a million times. And you’re going to give me the highlight reel on that whole Avengers vs. X-Men hoopla because I’m real upset I missed that.” 

Scott laughs a whisper of a laugh, and then before he knows it he’s hugging her. They’ve been through life and death together, and now they know for sure that life is the hard part. But it’s okay, probably. It’s probably going to be okay.

“Love you, Jeannie,” he says, kissing the side of her head.

“And I you, Slim.” 


End file.
